The present invention relates generally to a method for producing a cast wheel assembly and more particularly to a method and arrangement for producing a central wheel body upon which a rim portion of the wheel assembly may be attached. The wheel body is made of iron/carbide cast material and includes spoke heads which are arranged in a distributed pattern about the wheel body. Arranged in the spoke heads are supports for hammerhead bolts which operate to fasten the wheel rim and which include bolt heads inserted from outside of the wheel body through an angular slot which extends through a wall for supporting the bolt and through a supporting wall extending approximately perpendicularly thereof. In wheels of the type to which the present invention relates, when the bolt attaching the rim portion is tightened, it is held nonrotatably against the supporting wall in the central wheel body for the bolt.
The invention further relates to apparatus for performing the method and to a wheel body produced in accordance with the method.
Wheel bodies of the type mentioned are conventionally used for heavy trucks, tractors, trailers and the like wherein at least two rims are removably fastened on the wheel body by means of bolts which are arranged in a uniformly distributed pattern on the circumference of the wheel body.
In wheel bodies a distinction is usually drawn between a wheel spider and a wheel adapter, both of which serve to receive the wheel rims. The wheel adapter is designed only for receiving the wheel rims while the spider is mounted on the wheel hub. Accordingly, with respect to operation of the wheel, the wheel spider corresponds to the wheel adapter plus the wheel hub.
Cast wheel bodies of the type described above are disclosed in the prior art for example in Swiss Pat. No. 471 695 which discloses a structure of the type which has found acceptance.
However, because of the manual labor which is required in finishing the cast wheel bodies, the production techniques become relatively cumbersome. In the finished cast wheel bodies, slots must be deburred, bolt supports must be leveled and the wall for the bolt must be reduced to a predetermined thickness.
The manual labor involved produces disadvantages in that it becomes rather difficult to perform because of the inaccessability of the areas involved. As a result such manual labor tends to be rather time-consuming. Furthermore, there becomes involved the risk that tolerances will be exceeded and that therefore significance waste will result. Because of the production costs, it has therefore been attempted to explore possibilities for improving the techniques involved in the finishing of cast wheel bodies in order to enable more precise work to be performed less expensively and with greater speed.
It is therefore a goal of the present invention to provide a method for the production of wheel bodies and apparatus for performing the method wherein improvements over existing techniques may be enabled and wherein, particularly, the production procedures may be simplified and made less expensive. The invention is directed toward eliminating the disadvantages discussed above and toward increasing the quality of the wheel body produced while simultaneously reducing the number of rejects which result.